Imagine you’re walking down the street and someone comes up, hypnotises you, and takes all your money. You wouldn’t want that to happen, right? So why do you let people get away with it on the internet?

Hypnotic copywriting is a tried and trusted method of getting people to buy things. I see it all over the internet. Is it evil or immoral? No, I don’t think it is. Is it mind control? No. People can’t use these techniques to make you do something against your will.

But they can persuade you to buy things.

I don’t have an issue with this, and I don’t think there’s a hard delineation between hypnotic writing and non-hypnotic writing. It’s kind of a grey-goo area.

You could even argue that all great writing is, in a sense at least, hypnotic. Being lost in the world of a novel is a type of hypnotic experience, for example.

But when people use hypnotic techniques as part of a direct sales system, I like to be aware of it. If I know what the writer is doing, I can choose to go along with it (if I want to immerse myself in that novel), or choose to hold back – if I don’t really want to pay $97 for that e-book.

So, here are some of the tell-tale signs that someone is using hypnotic writing techniques to persuade to buy or do something:

1. Language

This is by far the most obvious sign, because the language used will often be quite different to non-hynpotic sales copy. Look out for words such as: peace, calm, relax, resources, easy, pleasant, strength, lovely, wonderful, warm, cool, fantastic, sleep, she, yes, girl, smiled, suddenly, wonder, imagine, story.

Look out for phrases, too, such as: you find yourself, you start to feel, you can let yourself, perhaps you can remember, wouldn’t it be wonderful if… you get the idea.

In hypnotherapy, these type of words are referred to as ‘nominalisations’. The words are hypnotic because they have no real meaning by themselves. The reader must ‘go inward’ to see decide what they mean from them. This creates an inner experience, which itself is hypnotic.

Watch out in particular for the word “imagine” as it links in so successfully with the second technique – story-telling – and in particular, getting the prospect to picture themselves using the product or service. (You’ll notice how I used the word “imagine” in the first paragraph of this post).

2. Story-telling

The hypnotic writer will weave stories into their sales copy. This will usually be a story about someone who used the product or service to get what they wanted in life. The writer will be painting a picture in your mind of how happy the person feels now they have the product.

Or, and this is very common with get rich-quick schemes on the ‘net, they will get you to imagine yourself, in the future, enjoying your new found wealth or whatever.

You’ll be led into imagining all the wonderful things you can do, and how your life will be fulfilled. Those positive feelings will be linked to the item for sale.

And you may find that your critical defences are weakened enough that you decide to give it a try. You end up making an impulse purchase. But it wasn’t really impulsive, it was manipulated.

The stories the writer uses will of course contain powerful sales messages. But this will usually be quite subtle. What they want you to do is to draw your own conclusions form the story, because that way you are much less likely to be sceptical.

Having drawn your own conclusion, you are basically convinced.

The story will usually fit into a normal sort of format. The main character will be in some form of conflict. There will come a moment of crisis, a turning point, which contains the moral of the story.

“Pete was struggling to make ends meet and he hadn’t had a holiday for three years. His girlfriend was on his back, and saying she couldn’t take it any more. When was he going to do something with his life? Why was he still stuck on that job that he always moaned about?

“But that day, Pete was out walking the dog, when he met his old friend from college, Tom. And Tom told him about ProductX and how his life had changed.
Pete decided it was time to stop prevaricating. He would act. He would show them all that he was a man of action. He would buy ProductX. Tom was right. Now was the time…”

3. ‘Intimacy’

The writer will try to create a feeling of intimacy, knowing that customers buy from people they like. They will try to put personality into their writing and build rapport. (Of course, you could argue that any decent writer, or even half-decent human, being would try to do this).

4. Tapping into emotions

The writer wants to get the reader into an emotional state of mind so that their critical defences are lowered. They will do this by trying to break the reader out of their day-to-day preoccupations and appeal to core emotional concerns. The language will be very visual. Testimonials will be used extensively to generate credibility and trust. A seemingly strong guarantee will be used to disarm caution.

5. Knocking down objections

You probably have good reasons why you don’t want to part with $97 for a get-rich e-book offer. The hypnotic writer will try to anticipate those objections and knock them over one by one.

One of the main reasons for not buying now is that you want to stop and think about it, so the offer will include time-limited price reductions or give-aways to try to stampede you into the sale.

By anticipating your objections the sales writer can deal with them on their own terms – hypnotically. This will often result in copy that reads like a dialogue between the reader and the writer. For example, the writer might make a big claim and them immediately attempt to deal with the reader’s scepticism.

Make $1,000 in your first month

Don’t believe me? Want some proof? Ask Tom, who used ProductX to ….

6. Subtle use of repetition

Ok, sometimes not so subtle. But the hypnotic writer will tend to repeat the main idea they want to get across many times. Repetition is said to be quite an effective hypnotic technique generally. The writer knows that the more you repeat the basic offer or reason to buy, the more it will influence the reader’s unconscious mind.

7. Giving commands

When people read, they are (in a sense at least) speaking the words in their mind. It’s almost like mouthing the words, but in your head, rather than by actually moving your lips. This can be used as a way to put hypnotic commands into the person’s mind.

The hypnotic writer will repeatedly use a command which encompasses what they want the reader to do. For example:

Buy productX and your life will be transformed. Joe decided to buy productX and he made over $2,000 in the first month. When you buy productX you get a complete money-back guarantee and our promise of ongoing support.

Also, when you buy productX today, you get 50% off the normal price. This offer won’t be around for long, so buy productX at the reduced rate while you can.

The idea is to keep using the phrase “buy productX” until the prospect can’t get the idea out of their head. Until they are persuaded that that is what they want to do.

8. Single-minded focus

The hypnotic copywriter will try to establish what is the one thing that prospects want from a product or service. It could be clearer skin, or a way to impress girls, or enough money to quit your day job.

Having decided what it should be (or better still, having discovered with certainty what that one thing is, through rigourous testing and questioning) the copywriter will then keep using that hypnotic command. It will be in the headline, in the first para, in the last para.

There might still be a long list of reasons why you should buy ProductX. But the writer will keep coming back to one thing that (he thinks or knows) will really press your buttons.

Keep your eyes open

This is a basic summary of some of the main techniques of hypnotic writing. As a consumer, I hope you can use this to be more aware of how copywriters persuade you to buy.

As a writer, you can keep an eye out for these techniques as well, as a way to learn more about hypnotic writing.

Of course, to really get the most out of this information, you’ll need to buy ProductX. ProductX is your guarantee of sales success on the Internet. Imagine what you can do with all the money you earn using ProductX, which for today only is on special offer at ….

If you enjoyed this post, please consider helping me promote it through whatever social media you use (Digg, StumbleUpon etc). Or link to it from your own blog. Or make a comment. Or tell people about it, in person or by email. Thanks for your help.

(Photo credit: launceston_lad CC on flickr)

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1. How to write your own sales copy: a 5-step formula
2. Hypnotic writing: a beginner’s guide
3. Story goals – a tale of three horses

Relax, I’m not going to try to sell you an e-book. Or anything else for that matter.

Yes, wouldn’t it be amazing if you could get some real information about hypnotic writing, without all the hype and brouhaha?

You probably know that there’s such a thing as hypnotic writing, and you’re intelligent enough to know….

OK, I’ll stop it now. Above are just a few words and phrases which are important in the technique of hypnotic copywriting. But, I promise you, the rest of this post is going to be written in something approaching normal language (or as close as I can get, at any rate).

Hypnotic writing and copywriting does exist. Hypnosis does exist. Can you use hypnosis to get anything you want in life? I doubt it. Can you sell ice to eskimos with hypnotic writing? Nah, I don’t think so.

But can a knowledge of these ideas help your writing? Yes, I think it can.

What is hypnotic copywriting?

I first encountered the idea of hypnotic writing when a prospective client mentioned it on the phone. (I’m a professional copywriter by day, by the way. I only put on my super-blogger cape at idle moments). This client was keen to find a hypnotic copywriter.

There’s a reason why you sit of the PC all day but get nothing done.

I asked him what he thought hypnotic copywriting was all about and he gave a sort of summary. It all had to do with persuading people to do something using only the power of your words, concentrating on what your product or service could do for the listener and how it could solve their problems.

I said to him, in all honesty, that it just sounded like normal copywriting to me – what any copywriter would do.

But, nonetheless I went away to investigate, partly because I have a passing interest in hypnosis.

Now, there’s a lot of guff out there about hypnosis. It’s a real new-age loony mindfield. (By now you’re probably guessing that I’m a bit of a sceptic at heart).

But there is a scientific-ish basis for hypnosis, and people who practice it with integrity and truthfulness. I’m not about to discuss the whole subject here. But if you want to know more, this is a good place to start.

You could also check out information about Milton Erickson and neuro linguistic programming around the web. Wikipedia is, as always, as good a place to start as any.

Perhaps the key to understanding true hypnosis is that you can’t make anyone do anything against their will. So you can’t ‘force’ people to buy a product with hypnotic copywriting.

Hypnosis is normal

But hypnosis is all around us. It’s just a normal trance state that people drift into and out of many times during a normal day. There’s a hypnotic quality to watching television, reading a book and even sitting at a computer. (There, you see – there’s a reason why you sit of the PC all day but get nothing done…)

It’s even been said, and I’m inclined to believe it, that all real learning takes place in a hypnotic state. Hypnosis is how we learn.

Joe Vitale is the main guru of hypnotic writing and has written extensively on the subject. In particular he has a book called Hypnotic Writing: How to Seduce and Persuade Customers with Only Your Words in which he says:

“Hypnotic Writing is a form of waking hypnosis. This is not magical or mystical. It’s no different than being absorbed in a goodmovie. Or being riveted by a good book. Or driving down the highway for hours and being “zoned out.” In each instance you are in a waking trance.A waking trance is a concentration of attention.”

So once we discard the whole stage hypnosis, mind control shenanigans, we can start to view hypnosis as a natural state into which people are likely to drift many times a day.

I think it’s very common when people are out shopping going around the stores looking at things they could buy. Are these people hypnotised, even to small extent? They look it to me.

And what about reading a great novel, when you get totally immersed in the world the writer has created? This is a hypnotic state too.

Get your message across more successfully

The bottom line is this. it’s easier to persuade people of something when you get their guard down a little, by gently using a few hypnotic techniques.

A natural state into which people are likely to drift many times a day.

I don’t think you can exert control over somebody in this way and I wouldn’t want to. But you can get your message across more successfully by writing in ways that make people respond in a favourable way. Every writer does this, and many, many writers and others practice hypnotic techniques without ever knowing it.

So it’s not unethical, necessarily, though of course it all depends on how you use. But if I thought you could screw people over by hypnotising them into buying rubbish they don’t want, I wouldn’t be telling you about it and I wouldn’t use it myself.

So, on this blog I’m going to post a series of articles about the subject of hypnotic writing. This will, hopefully, build into a solid introduction to the subject. There are quite a few areas to look at. And I’m going to be sceptical too – as I believe you should be. But for now, take a quick tour of hypnosis here, and come back for the rest of the series, where, over time, we’ll find out more about how to use hypnotic writing to connect with our readers and improve our copy.

Photo credit: launceston_lad on flickr

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1. Don’t get robbed blind on the internet: 8 tell-tale signs of hypnotic sales copy
2. Beat writer’s block – get in the zone
3. Four ways to take your writing to another level